Stay on target

Since her July reveal as the 13th Doctor, Jodie Whittaker has become a worldwide sensation.

As evidenced by the “fair few people” waiting by the BBC Radio 2 studio over the weekend.

“Last time I came on the show … there [were] autograph hunters outside who ignored me,” Whittaker told Saturday Breakfast host Dermot O’Leary in a recent interview. “This time, it was like, ‘Hi! Hi!'” she said of her new fans.

Following the announcement that Broadchurch creator Chris Chibnall would take over for long-time DW boss Steven Moffat, Whittaker got a surprising casting call.

“We were having what I thought was a work chat” about season three of Broadchurch, she said. In reality, it was a proposal for her to audition for the new female role.

Despite an established friendship with the writer/producer, Whittaker admitted the process was not easy.

“They needed to make sure I was right for the part,” she explained. “It was certainly not handed to me on a plate.

“Chris knows me, and knows I can do certain things,” she continued. “But he also knows me as Beth Latimer; he needed to be able to see that there’s different sides and that I can draw on that.”

Jodie Whittaker (via BBC)

Keeping the secret was a “full military operation.”

Whittaker in March found out she got the job—a secret she had to keep until BBC’s July 16 global reveal.

“No one could know before,” she said, admitting to having told her husband (“that doesn’t count, does it?”) and mom. “And then my dad was FURIOUS!”

“It was amazing that [Fleabag writer and star] Phoebe Waller-Bridge [bookies’ favorite to take on the part] dealt with [the media attention] so amazingly and gracefully and at no point could I text her and go, ‘I’m so sorry,'” Whittaker said with a laugh.

In fact, she was so far under the radar for months that she and her agent called the job “The Clooney”—a reference to George, who became famous playing a doctor on ER.

“It just made it easier for me,” Whittaker said. “I basically whispered for three months, and it was getting really tedious.” So much so that even in her own home, “if the window was open in the flat … I’d go, ‘What have I said? What have I said?'”

Whittaker in Attack the Block (via Screen Gems)

“It only worked for me to be sneaky.”

“I knew my life could still be under the radar to a certain extent” until the post-Wimbledon reveal,” she told O’Leary. “So it’s in my absolute benefit to not be sat in a pub telling everyone.

“It only worked for me to be sneaky and have a big hood reveal, that looked so cool,” she exclaimed.

Jodie Whittaker is the Thirteenth Doctor (via BBC)

“You don’t get typecast as a Time Lord.”

Fresh off three seasons as a grieving mother in Broadchurch, Whittaker is now fully ensconced in BBC drama Trust Me, in which she plays—what else?—a doctor.

The four-part series is set in Edinburgh, and tells the story of Cath Hardacre, a nurse who loses her job for whistleblowing, then steals her best friend’s identity to start a new job as a physician.

For those unaware of Whittaker’s work (and shame on you!), Trust Me may seen a bit “confusing,” she said, noting that it is “nothing like” her next, timey wimey role.

“Every job is a world away from Doctor Who. Which is why it’s the dream part,” she continued. “You can never say, ‘Oh, I’m typecast.’ You don’t get typecast as a Time Lord.”

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